A deity who becomes split into two or more distinct and lesser deities. The most common variant of this trope sees the god in question split into two new beings, which often serve as Shadow Archetypes of one another — a common variant has the two new gods represent the good and evil, light and dark, orderly and chaotic, or creative and destructive parts of their progenitor. Similarly, a god of a broad domain may divide into gods of specific and opposing halves of that concept — for instance, a god of luck may produce a god of good luck and one of bad. In other cases, the original may split into a large number of lesser beings, each potentially carrying a specific facet of the primordial godhead's personality or powers.
Such a split can come about for a variety of reasons. A conflict of inner thoughts, something like an extreme case of an Enemy Without or a Literal Split Personality, may cause a god to split apart into independent parts. In settings where Gods Need Prayer Badly, multiple faiths with different interpretations of a shared god could affect the deity by splitting into multiple versions to match each interpretation.
This can overlap with Residual Evil Entity when a deity is purged or purges itself of evil or destructive tendencies that then become a new being.
Typically, the resulting deities will either seek reunion into the original whole or become bitter enemies instead. One of those deities may confront the other in The Underworld as part of a self-actualization story. Not to be confused with Pieces of God, where all of humanity (or whatever applicable mortal species) has a small part of God inside of them.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Ah! My Goddess: Urd gets split into Goddess and Demon halves, with the former acting much more like her kindly sister Belldandy and the latter more like her Jerkass mother (not to mention Demon-Urd taking the Stripperiffic outfits of regular-Urd to extremes). They eventually realize that neither Urd is the true Urd and recombine.
- Dragon Ball: When the nameless Namekian wanted to become God of the Earth, he expelled all of his evil, which took on a life of its own as the Great Demon King Piccolo. After being sealed for hundreds of years, being released, and eventually dying at Goku's hand, Piccolo reincarnates himself as his own son. Piccolo Jr. eventually undergoes a Heel–Face Turn and re-merges with God.
- GoLion: The titular character, is basically one of these. Once a matchless robotic warrior-type being, he challenged a goddess and was split into five robotic lions, whose chosen pilots can reform them into GoLion once more.
- Record of Ragnarok: The Japanese god of fortune, Zerofuku, attempted to alleviate humanity of its suffering by absorbing their misfortunte. The massive pain, coupled with the exposure to human vice, caused him to spiral into madness, and then, split into the Seven Lucky Gods before he could punish humanity. In the present, the Seven fuse back into Zerofuku for the fight against Buddha. Ultimately, Zerofuku's spirit ascends along with his other aspects to the afterlife.
Comic Books
- The Anti-Life Equation in Death of the New Gods is depicted as a being who was split after the world of the Old Gods of the Third World. However, considering the canonicity of that story this characterisation may or may not still be canon.
- Immortal Hulk: The One Below All, a massive Eldritch Abomination and the Greater-Scope Villain of the series, is revealed to be the One Above All's (God, essentially) own dark facet, its Hulk if you will.
Literature
- American Gods: The Slavic god Czernobog ("black god") and his twin Bielebog ("white god") are implied to be the same person with a Split Personality, though only Czernobog is seen in the novel.
- The Belgariad: Two opposed Sentient Cosmic Forces of Prophecy exist Above the Gods and drive the main conflict. They were created when an ancient cataclysm divided the consciousness of the Universe itself, and each is competing to defeat the other and become the Universe's guiding force going forward.
- The Cosmere: Exaggerated. The mysterious godlike being Adonalsium ended up being shattered into sixteen pieces (or Shards), with each bearing an aspect of its power and will. The overarching plot of Mistborn: The Original Trilogy, for example, concerns the struggle between the Shard of Preservation and that of Ruin over the world of Scadrial, which ends with both Shards being reunited within a single deity, Harmony, ending the conflict and rebuilding Scadrial.
- Endo and Kobayashi Live! The Latest on Tsundere Villainess Lieselotte: The Creation Myth of the MagiKoi universe involves this; the entity that created the universe is unity in form but, when they descend to the universe's equivalent of Earth, it was divided into a God Couple, Kuon and Lirenna.
- The Heroes of Olympus, a sequel series to Percy Jackson and the Olympians, portrays the Roman and Greek interpretations of various deities (Jupiter and Zeus, for instance) as existing both as the same being and as different entities to one another. These aspects can have radically different personalities — Ares is a violent, thuggish bully while Mars is a mature, respected military leader — and some deities, such as Athena/Minerva, have considerable trouble reconciling clashing parts of these selves.
- That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime: True Demon Lord Dagruel and his "brothers" Glassord and Fenn are the three-thirds of the original Mad King of the Giants, Ashura. This "Wicked God" was born as the very incarnation of the earth and rampaged through the world until Veldanava came along and defeated him, splitting him into the three brothers. While Dagruel and Glassord eventually repented of their evil ways, Fenn did not and so Veldanava imprisoned him in the Star Palace while tasking the other two with watching over the entrance to the palace and his chief angel Feldway served as his jailor directly. However, long after Veldanava's death, Feldway, who grew increasingly vengeful at the world for said death, freed Fenn, who in turn had formed a Villainous Friendship with the angel and proceeded to brainwash Dagruel and Glassord to the villain's side. Ultimately the three would recombine into Ashura to fight Veldora, Shion, and Luminous Valentine during the final arc before Veldora manages to separate them again.
- Thief of Time: Turns out to be the secret of the anthropomorphic personification of Time's two sons Jeremy Clockson and Lobsang Ludd. Both were originally one entity, but a particularly painful contraction and a small mistake by their mother split them in two. Recombining allows them to assume their mother's mantle when she retires (as well as help save the world.)
Live-Action TV
- Supernatural: It's eventually revealed that Chuck/God and Amara/The Darkness were once a single primordial being before they separated, which is what Caused the Big Bang. Near the end of Season 15, Chuck manipulates Amara into performing a Fusion Dance to merge themselves back together, albeit with Chuck solely in control.
Mythology & Religion
- Christianity: Most mainstream denominations (i.e. subscribing at least to the Council of Nicea) admit the doctrine of the Trinity, of a single deity with three separate persons inside — the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit — that are concurrently three beings and one.
- Egyptian Mythology: The war goddess Sekhmet was created by Ra to enact divine retribution on a populace that had stopped worshipping and respecting him. Sekhmet nearly wipes out humankind, which forces Ra and the other deities to get her drunk enough that she passes out, after which she is divided into two different gods. Sekhmet remains, but depending on the source, the offshoot deity is either Hathor, goddess of motherhood, or Bastet, goddess of fertility and cats.
- Inanna's Descent to the Netherworld: Inanna, the goddess of fertility, travels to the underworld to confront Ereshkigal, the goddess of death. Inanna is transformed into a corpse and Ereshkigal suffers the pain of childbirth. The two goddesses are divided but linked.
- Japanese Mythology: Enraged at the death of his wife Izanami by childbirth, the god Izanagi chopped the fire god, Kagutsuchi, into eight separate pieces for accidentally burning her alive. All of those eight pieces became volcanoes and his blood became many lesser water deities.
Tabletop Games
- Dungeons & Dragons:
- The halflings' patron deity Yondalla is known as a squeaky-clean, Lawful Good goddess of family and protection, but one of the race's biggest secrets is that she has a dark twin of sorts. Yondalla waited to create her race until she'd seen the other deities make their own and was so impressed that she borrowed some of what made them each special to put into her halflings — a bit of the elves' grace and speed, a pinch of the dwarves' devotion to community, some of the humans' ambition, and so forth. The other gods were annoyed but were willing to let Yondalla's offense slide if she got rid of her larcenous streak. When she did so, these darker impulses coalesced into the Chaotic Neutral goddess Dallah Thaun, a deity of secrets and trickery. Rather than an Enemy Without, Dallah Thaun complements Yondalla as a separate aspect of the same whole — they can hear each others' prayers and have the same dedication to the halflings' well-being, they just differ in their methods. When a halfling needs healing or a plentiful harvest he prays to Yondalla, but when it's time to relieve others of their wealth or seek vengeance against those that would harm the little folk, halflings pray to Dallah Thaun.
- Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition: The dragon god Io was cut in two by the King of Terror, Erek-Hus. The two halves then rose up as a pair of new deities, Bahamut and Tiamat, who then killed Erek-Hus. All Io's evil qualities, his hubris, arrogance, and envy, were embodied in Tiamat, while his good qualities, his desire to protect, and his sense of equality, were embodied in Bahamut. Both gods inherited Io's preference for working alone and became bitter enemies after the battle. In previous editions, Bahamut and Tiamat were instead the children of Io.
- Forgotten Realms:
- Centuries before the rise of mankind, the Sarrukh ruled the world thanks to the aid of their god, the World Serpent. As the World Serpent gave Sarrukh power, the Sarrukh gave the World Serpent worship and prayer. As they expanded their empire, they subjugated the other races and forced them to adopt their beliefs. This ultimately caused a change to the World Serpent. While the other races did worship it, they still had different needs and demands when it came to who or what they worshipped. The numerous different and contradicting beliefs caused the World Serpent to split a multiplicity of gods. It's believed that most of the modern deities of reptilian species, such as Asgorath, Essylliss, Jazirian, M'daess, Merrshaulk, Semuanya, Shekinester, Ssharstrune and Sss'thasine'ss, are these fragments.
- There was once a goddess named Tyche who governed all aspects of luck, but she was split into Tymora, goddess of good luck and Beshaba, goddess of misfortune during an event called the Dawn Cataclysm.
- Null, the dragons' God of the Dead, is worshiped as a two-aspected deity. His two aspects are known as the Reaver, who represents undeath and death as a destructive force and is regarded as Neutral Evil, and the Guardian of the Lost, who passively watches over draconic souls as they pass into the afterlife and is regarded as True Neutral. In other settings, these two aspects are depicted as wholly separate deities, the creeping and destructive Falazure and the dispassionate Chronepsis.
Video Games
- Baldur's Gate: One of the lore books that the player can read describes how Jergal, Lord of the End of Everything, became bored of his role and allowed his power to pass on to three adventurers who challenged him — but since they couldn't agree on who should rule, his power was split between them instead. Bane became the god of Strife, Bhaal became the god of Murder, and Myrkul became the god of the Dead. Jergal himself remained to serve as their seneschal, retired from godhood and was happy about it.
- Bayonetta 2: Loki and Loptr are the good and evil halves of Aesir, the God of Chaos. When Aesir split his power into the Eyes of the World, he split his soul into two incarnations. By the end of the game, however, Loptr forcibly takes both Eyes and Loki's Sovereign Power, taking over the body of Aesir and becoming the game's Final Boss.
- BlazBlue: There are two examples, both of which are similar yet different. Interestingly for this trope, while the deity is divided, the god in question is still technically active.
- First there's the Susano'o. Before the start of the series, the Susano'o Unit was without a soul, meaning that anyone, provided they had the will and strength to use it, could use it and become the new Susano'o. That's how one incarnation of Jin Kisaragi became Hakumen. But that's the bodynote , what happened to the original soul? Well, as it turns out, you've been fighting against him the entire time. He's Yuuki Terumi.
- Second there's Amaterasu. The Amaterasu Unit (Master Unit) is piloted by someone known as the Origin. While she still resides inside the Master Unit, the manifestation of her soul lives on earth living as Saya. Unfortunately, because of the torture at the hands of Yuuki Terumi and Relius Clover, her soul split into two. One half would become Noel Vermillion/Mu 12, Kusanagi the Godslayer, and the other would become Izanami the Goddess of Death.
- Boxxy Quest: In the series backstory, the goddess Virtua split herself in two to settle her conflicting feelings about humanity. Legion was the darker half, representing her hatred of humanity... and, when they fought, he ended up winning. As a result, Virtua was reincarnated as Catie, while Legion would eventually be split into the Anons.
- Breath of Fire IV: Ryu and Fou-Lu form a Fire/Ice Duo, with Ryu having fire-themed abilities while Fou-Lu's abilities are themed around water and ice. They are also two halves of an entity known as the Yorae Dragon, an immensely powerful god who was split into two beings by the summoning ritual that brought it into the world.
- Diablo: The Old God Anu was the first being and the "sum of all things". When it attempted to purify itself of his evil aspects, they coalesced into the Prime Evil, Tathamet. Their mutually destructive Divine Conflict created the physical universe, and their bodies transformed into Heaven and Hell.
- Dragalia Lost: A long time ago, Xenos, fed up with how horrible humanity was, performed a Face–Heel Turn in which he literally discarded his heart. It turns out that this heart was Morsayati, and Morsayati ended up getting divided up even further. They would split into Mordecai and Morsayati, beings Made of Good and Made of Evil respectively. A thousand years later, and Morsayati would re-emerge, where their body would be used to create new life. One of these was, of course, Euden. In other words, Euden is a part of Xenos' heart.
- Dragon Quest IX: The endgame's grotto bosses turn out to be aspects of the creator god Zenus who split apart out of grief and incomprehension at his daughter turning into a tree to stop him destroying mortals, and representing different aspects of his personality or body (rage, intellect, blood, arm, etc.)
- Elden Ring: Marika and Radagon are revealed to be the same person. In classic FromSoft fashion, however, this revelation brings up more questions than answers.
- Final Fantasy XIV: Nald'thal, god of commerce and the afterlife, is worshipped as one of the Twelve, a pantheon of deities who are said to be the patrons of Eorzea. However, in the Ul'dahn tradition, Nald'thal is in fact a pair of Conjoined Twins: Nald, who presides over commerce and the living, and Thal, who presides over the dead. The Myths of the Realms raids reveal that Nald'thal was in fact created as one entity, but mankind's prayers and legends split him into Nald and Thal.
- Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn: The two goddesses of the world are actually the same goddess who split herself in half after her emotions went out of control and caused The Great Flood. The goddess of chaos must journey to confront her sister the goddess of order.
- Genshin Impact: This turns out to be the truth behind Focalors, the Archon ruling over Fontaine. As part of a centuries-long plot to fool the Heavenly Principles and save her people, she divided herself into two beings, one mortal and one divine. Her physical form became Furina, an ordinary mortal tasked with serving as a Body Double to distract both the world and the Heavenly Principles. Meanwhile, her divinity was sealed within the Oratrice Mecanique d'Analyse Cardinale and worked to gather enough power to destroy the throne of the Hydro Archon. As the prophecy reaches its final stage, the divine half emerges to carry out her own execution, finally allowing Furina to live as her own person.
- Kirby and the Forgotten Land: Fecto Elfilis is a mysterious but all-powerful godlike alien who was captured and experimented on. When trying to escape one day, the good within them was separated from the rest of the body. This good became Elfilin, and Fecto Forgo spends the game trying to reunite with its missing part for the sake of gaining power again.
- League of Legends: Played with for the Kindred, a pair of deities comprised of the peaceful, bright Lamb and the brutal, shadowy Wolf. It is implied that the two were once a single entity — the Gray Man, originally death itself, who split himself into two to have a friend. Although technically two spirits, the Kindred always appear together and consider themselves as a single entity.
- Marenian Tavern Story: Patty and the Hungry God: The titular hungry god is Coco, the God of Poverty. Originally, before being split in two, he was the God of Luck. The Final Boss is Coco's other half, Toto, which, unlike the friendly Coco whose power causes bad luck even if he doesn't want it to, and isn't bitter about being sealed away for about five centuries. Toto hates the world for sealing him away for over a millennium, his powers cause calamities, and he fully intends to destroy the world with his powers. In the end Patty and her party defeat Toto, and he and Coco reunite and become the God of Luck once again.
- Pokémon Black and White: The story behind Zekrom and Reshiram, the main Legendary Pokémon of the games, is that they used to be one being until the twin brothers who commanded it began to argue whether to fight for truth and ideals. Thus the original dragon split itself into two, with Zekrom embodying yin and siding with the ideals-focused brother, and Reshiram embodying yang and siding with the truth-focused brother. There is also a third Pokémon, Kyurem, embodying void, who is said to be what remains of the original dragon. Kyurem can merge with either Zekrom or Reshiram, but not both.
- Shin Megami Tensei and Persona:
- The multiple shards of the original YHVH. Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey mentions that the elder mother goddesses fought back when He originally sealed them, and while they were unable to stop him, they managed to shatter him into several pieces, particularly Metatron, which has a fraction of the original's will, and the Demiurge, which is nothing but raw power and a demented need to be worshipped.
- There is the demon/Persona known as Ardha (coined from Hindu deity Ardhanarishvara), who can be obtained by fusing its individual components together: Shiva and Parti. The original meaning of Ardhanarishvara is the Lord Who is Half Woman, with the male half having aspects of Shiva while the female half is represented by Parti. In some Hindu texts, Ardhanarishvara is an androgynous incarnation of Shiva, while in others it is the form of Shiva and Parvati, who loved each other so deeply that they joined as one being rather than stay apart.
- Persona 3: In the process of gathering enough Shadows to allow the Death Shadow to incarnate, Eiichiro Takeba interfered with the process and caused Death to be split into thirteen pieces. Twelve became the Arcana Shadows, while Death's incomplete main body was sealed by Aigis into the Protagonist as a child, leading him to gain the identity of Pharos. Destroying all of the Arcana Shadows allows Pharos to absorb them back and leave the Protagonist's psyche to properly become Death, but Pharos' bond with the Protagonist gives him a shred of humanity enough to instead incarnate into a human form, Ryoji Mochizuki. On New Year's Eve, Ryoji sheds his human form as Nyx's will starts to inhabit him as a vessel, and exactly one month later, Nyx's consciousness has integrated within him and turns him into the Nyx Avatar, ready to bring about the Fall.
- Sonic the Hedgehog:
- Sonic Shuffle: The two main members of Maginaryworld, protagonist Lumina Flowlight and antagonist Void, are the good and evil halves of Illumina, the Goddess of Dreams who had shattered in two because of self-doubt.
- Sonic the Hedgehog (2006): Two of the game's main villains — Iblis, a mindlessly destructive fire demon, and Mephiles, a cunning, manipulative creature of darkness — are actually split aspects of Solaris, a god of light and time. They eventually recombine for the True Final Boss of the game.
- Xenoblade Chronicles: Shows up with Zanza and his opposite number in the sequel The Architect. Both are two halves of the same entity, but split across two universes, each having part of their predecessor's personality traits. In fact, the sprite for the Architect is actually only half a body because his other half is elsewhere.
Webcomics
- Kill Six Billion Demons: There was originally a single supreme god, YISUN, who embodied both everything that exists and everything that doesn't, the sum total of all reality. YISUN was tormented by their immense loneliness, and they divided themself into two different gods in a suicide known as the First Division, which separated existence from nonexistence. Two new gods were created from this: YIS, the goddess of existence, life, and change, and UN, the god of non-existence, death, and stasis; they fought, mated, and divided themselves into the Multiplicity of 777,777 deities who created the material universe with their own deaths.
- The Gods of Arr-Kelaan: Sharra, the goddess of fortune, was split into two versions of herself by Loki — one grants good luck, and the other bad. He thought that, being opposites of each other, they'd be driven to fight, but they instead teamed up to thrash him and afterwards agreed to collaborate to ensure that mortals would not have either too much good or ill fortune.
- Nodwick: One issue has a god named Schizophrenius who is divided into Chaotic and Lawful halves. The party-animal worshipers of the Chaotic side stole the Lawful side's temple, who hired the protagonists to get it back.
Western Animation
- The Legend of Korra: Vaatu and Raava, the Spirits of Darkness and Light, grow within each other until forced to divide apart. This is how each of them reincarnates after death. It's implied they may have originally been a single spirit, given all other spirits have both a light and dark side within themselves.
